Children of the Forest: While shifting, you ignore difficult terrain, as long as that terrain is caused by trees, underbrush, or other plants.

Fey Origin: You are considered a fey creature for the purpose of effects that relate to creature origin.

Faerie Companion: You are accompanied by a Faerie companion, who helps you on your quests. This grants you the Arcane Familiar feat for free, regardless of class prerequisites. Your Faerie Companion uses these mechanics:

Deku Faerie Familiar

A tiny globe of light glows beside you. Deep within, you can barely make out a beautiful humanoid shape with gossamer wings. “Hey!” She calls to you. “Listen!”

Senses: low-light visionSpeed: fly 6 (hover)

Constant BenefitsYou gain a +2 bonus to Monster Knowledge checks. In addition, you may attempt to make Monster Knowledge checks untrained.You can read & speak Hylian, if this language is used in your game.The Deku Fairy radiates dim light in a radius of 2 squares.

Active BenefitsFairy Speech: A Deku Fairy can speak any language you know, and it can converse with other creatures. When it speaks, you hear everything it says and hear everything spoken to it. You can dictate its answers if you so choose.

Regardless of the type of Familiar chosen, the form of the Fairy Companion is the same - that of a tiny, glowing fairy with gossamer wings. You may take other Familiar feats to improve your Fairy Companion, even if you do not meet arcane class prerequisites

Faerie Guidance: You have the Faerie Guidancepower.

Faerie Guidance

Kokiri Racial Power

Your fairy companion hovers by the enemy, pointing out weaknesses in its defenses.

Encounter

Minor Action

Close Burst 1

Requirement: Your Faerie Companion must be in active mode, and the origin square of the burst is the Faerie Companion’s square

Target: One enemy in burst

Effect: You and all allies gain a +2 power bonus to attack the enemy until the end of your next turn. Also, your next attack against the enemy before the end of your next turn deals an extra +1d6 damage.11th: +2d6 damage.21st: +3d6 damage.

Play a Kokiri if you want...

* to be shy and retiring with those you don’t know, but childlike and friendly with those you do.

* to travel with a Faerie companion that can guide the attacks of you and your allies.

* to be a member of a race that favors the bard, monk, ranger, and cleric classes.

PHYSICAL QUALITIES

Kokiri have the appearance of small children of human, half-elven, elven, or Hylian stock. Their skin ranges in color from very pale to darkly tanned, with some Kokiri showing a greenish tint to their skin. Their hair is most often straight, and may be blonde, light brown, red, or even green. Much like elves and Hylians, Kokiri have long, pointed ears. Eyes can be green, blue or brown, with some Kokiri having eyes so dark they appear black. Kokiri can’t grow facial hair and have little body hair.

Kokiri do not reproduce as other races do, instead appearing as babies in hollows at the base of the village’s sacred tree. Young Kokiri reach full physical maturity by twelve years of age. Kokiri who have reached full physical maturity do not age, and can live for centuries or even millenia unless killed. Kokiri do not die of old age, instead fading back into the forests from which they came.

PLAYING A KOKIRI

Kokiri gather in villages throughout the Feywild and the natural world. These villages most often appear in remote, unspoiled forests where the shy Kokiri can remain untroubled by intruders. Many Kokiri spend their whole lives within the forests without meeting members of another race.

Each Kokiri village is based around a Treant, which the Kokiri see as an avatar or descendant of the Great Deku Tree (the creator and patron deity of their race). These sacred Treants only rarely move, and usually serve as rulers, advisors, and guides to the childlike Kokiri in times of crisis. On most matters, the Kokiri tend to themselves, often governing themselves with a small council or a single “boss.”

Items of Kokiri craftsmanship are rarely made of metal; instead, the Kokiri prefer to work with natural materials such as wood, leather, wool, and plant fibers in order to create their goods. These items sometimes seem to be roughly made, but there is always a simple, rustic beauty, even to the roughest work.

Kokiri are, as a whole, a shy and secretive race. Few of them leave their forest villages, and many believe that doing so will cause them to fade away before their time. Many Kokiri are frightened and distrustful of the world outside their village, and even Kokiri from other villages are sometimes shunned or ostracized for the differences between them. Members of other races rarely find Kokiri villages, and those who do are usually driven away by the use of clever tricks. Despite these tendencies, Kokiri are essentially kind-hearted, and it’s not unheard of for a village to take pity on a wounded traveler, leaving food where he can find it and salving his wounds while he sleeps.

Chosen of the Forest: You gain the Forest Walk ability. In addition, when in difficult terrain caused by trees, underbrush, or other plants you may make a Stealth check to become hidden with only cover or concealment, rather than supreme cover or total concealment

Distracting Faerie: Prerequisites: Kokiri, Rogue, Sneak attack class feature. Rather than granting a power bonus to hit, your Faerie Guidance power causes the target enemy to grant combat advantage. In addition, you may deal the extra damage granted by your Sneak Attack class ability to the target of your Faerie Guidance, even if you have already used it this round.

Very amusing, and very good! My only suggestions are that you switch the location of the Target and Requirement lines (so that you read the requirement first - it just makes more sense to me that way) and that "basic" is spelt with an "i."

No, seems mostly balanced to me. A familiar's benefits seems about as useful as any remaining racial features you may want to add, so that should be all good.

My only thought is that perhaps Guided Strike could grant combat advantage instead of an unnamed +2 attack bonus. It really depends on if you want Combat Advantage to stack with this power or not. If not, make the bonus instead Combat Advantage. If so, call the bonus a power bonus.

I've made some changes, expanded the writeup, and added the first two racial feats I could think of. Not sure of the balance of feats yet, so if one or both of those needs to be Paragon or Epic, let me know.

I love it =D. The way you wrote it up it could be easily part of a D&D campaign world without any changes to the nature of the Kokiri. For balance I only think extra damage is a bit much, I mean, it would stack with Sneak attack and so on, dealing a lot of damage. I personally actually prefer the +2 POWER bonus than combat advantage because combat advantage might be exploitet by powers, but I am not sure.

I don't feel the damage is overpowered, myself. I compared this ability to the Dragonborn's Dragon Breath, which has the ability to deal up to 9d6 damage in a minor action at 1st level if you're lucky and your enemy's stupid. This ability affects only a single enemy, meaning that it can only ever grant 1d6 at first level. Plus, the extra damage needs an extra standard action (and successful attack roll) within a short time.

I went with the power bonus to hit (with a Kokiri/Rogue racial feat changing it to combat advantage).

I usually play diminuitive races with joy--halflings, goblins, kobolds, especially gnomes. So, this is right up my alley.

This race adds something to the available options the others don't: immortality. And even beyond that, eternal youth. (Warforged don't count because you don't get to experience human sensations and emotions.)

For someone who can live for so long, I wonder how difficult it would be to not become cynical or apathetic. Eventually everyone you know (aside from other kokiri, and maybe warforged) will grow old and die.

And the roleplaying possibilities are fantastic. I can imagine many a people not familir with kokiri would think you a prodigy or a sevant. How would they know you are really 784 years old?

Right off the bat, I could imagine an adventure based around a (non-kokiri) king obsessed with becoming immortal. He abducts kokiri to put them through tortuous experiments and imprisons them for observation. That brings back memories of The Dark Crystal, with the Skeksis stealing vitality from the podlings... ramblerambleramble

Yes, I am expressing my opinions (even complaints - le gasp!) about the current iteration of the play-test that we actually have in front of us.
No, I'm not going to wait for you to tell me when it's okay to start expressing my concerns (unless you are WotC).
(And no, my comments on this forum are not of the same tone or quality as my actual survey feedback.)

I'd suggest you limit the familair options to one, which you define. Mostly for simplicity: it's always a bear for me to comb through all the available familars anyway. The traits of the kokiri's fairies don't seem to differ much.

I'd suggest you limit the familair options to one, which you define. Mostly for simplicity: it's always a bear for me to comb through all the available familars anyway. The traits of the kokiri's fairies don't seem to differ much.

I'm with Damon_Tor on that. I love familiars for the potential for fun, their quirks are the best thing that Wizards has come up with for D&D in my opinion...anyway! You list a bunch of familiars but all you're doing is giving them potential stats, the looks are the same.

Either just pick one or two that are different. Or just homebrew and little light ball fairy, it's actually not hard to homebrew familiars if you keep them simply.

Hrm. Makes sense. Which would you suggest? Looking through the Familiar list, the three that seem most appropriate right now are the Coure Attendant, Muse Sprite, and Moon Wisp. Those seem appropriate?

Or if you think I should just create a statblock for 'em out of hand, what would you suggest?

Well, homebrewing your own would have the benefit of making this more usable without cross-referencing. I, for one, don't even know where to look for the Coure Attendant, Muse Sprite, or Moon Wisp. I would suggest at the very least to include an option from Arcane Power, but having looked at those, none of them really fit all that well.

So, personally, I'd rather you just put together a whole unique familiar for them - even if it winds up sharing qualities with a few other familiar options.

Yes, I am expressing my opinions (even complaints - le gasp!) about the current iteration of the play-test that we actually have in front of us.
No, I'm not going to wait for you to tell me when it's okay to start expressing my concerns (unless you are WotC).
(And no, my comments on this forum are not of the same tone or quality as my actual survey feedback.)

How's this look so far? Don't have my books with me, so I can't recall if it's already possible to make monster knowledge checks untrained - if it is, remove that bit. I imagine these Fairies rarely working for non-Deku spellcasters, but it happens sometimes.

Deku Fairy Familiar

A tiny globe of light glows beside you. Deep within, you can barely make out a beautiful humanoid shape with gossamer wings. “Hey!” She calls to you. “Listen!”

Senses: low-light visionSpeed: fly 6 (hover)

Constant BenefitsYou gain a +2 bonus to Monster Knowledge checks. In addition, you may attempt to make Monster Knowledge checks untrained.You can read & speak Hylian, if this language is used in your game.The Deku Fairy radiates dim light in a radius of 2 squares.

Active BenefitsFairy Speech: A Deku Fairy can speak any language you know, and it can converse with other creatures. When it speaks, you hear everything it says and hear everything spoken to it. You can dictate its answers if you so choose.

Children of the Forest: You can shift through difficult terrain, as long as that terrain is caused by trees, underbrush, or other plants.

Fey Origin: You are considered a fey creature for the purpose of effects that relate to creature origin.

Faerie Companion: You are accompanied by a Faerie companion, who helps you on your quests. This grants you the Arcane Familiar feat for free, regardless of class prerequisites. Your Faerie Companion can use the mechanics for any Familiar from this list:

Regardless of the type of Familiar chosen, the form of the Fairy Companion is the same - that of a tiny, glowing fairy with gossamer wings. You may take other Familiar feats to improve your Fairy Companion, even if you do not meet arcane class prerequisites

Guiding Faerie: You have the Guiding Faerie power.

Guiding Faerie

Kokiri Racial Power

Your fairy companion hovers by the enemy, pointing out weaknesses in its defenses.

Encounter

Minor Action

Personal

Requirement: Your Faerie Companion must be in active mode.

Target: One creature adjacent to your Faerie Companion

Effect: You and all allies gain a +2 power bonus to attack the enemy until the end of your next turn. Also, your next attack against the enemy before the end of your next turn deals an extra +1d6 damage.11th: +2d6 damage.21st: +3d6 damage.

Play a Kokiri if you want...

* to be shy and retiring with those you don’t know, but childlike and friendly with those you do.

* to travel with a Faerie companion that can guide the attacks of you and your allies.

* to be a member of a race that favors the bard, monk, ranger, and cleric classes.

PHYSICAL QUALITIES

Kokiri have the appearance of small children of human, half-elven, elven, or Hylian stock. Their skin ranges in color from very pale to darkly tanned, with some Kokiri showing a greenish tint to their skin. Their hair is most often straight, and may be blonde, light brown, red, or even green. Much like elves and Hylians, Kokiri have long, pointed ears. Eyes can be green, blue or brown, with some Kokiri having eyes so dark they appear black. Kokiri can’t grow facial hair and have little body hair.

Kokiri do not reproduce as other races do, instead appearing as babies in hollows at the base of the village’s sacred tree. Young Kokiri reach full physical maturity by twelve years of age. Kokiri who have reached full physical maturity do not age, and can live for centuries or even millenia unless killed. Kokiri do not die of old age, instead fading back into the forests from which they came.

PLAYING A KOKIRI

Kokiri gather in villages throughout the Feywild and the natural world. These villages most often appear in remote, unspoiled forests where the shy Kokiri can remain untroubled by intruders. Many Kokiri spend their whole lives within the forests without meeting members of another race.

Each Kokiri village is based around a Treant, which the Kokiri see as an avatar or descendant of the Great Deku Tree (the creator and patron deity of their race). These sacred Treants only rarely move, and usually serve as rulers, advisors, and guides to the childlike Kokiri in times of crisis. On most matters, the Kokiri tend to themselves, often governing themselves with a small council or a single “boss.”

Items of Kokiri craftsmanship are rarely made of metal; instead, the Kokiri prefer to work with natural materials such as wood, leather, wool, and plant fibers in order to create their goods. These items sometimes seem to be roughly made, but there is always a simple, rustic beauty, even to the roughest work.

Kokiri are, as a whole, a shy and secretive race. Few of them leave their forest villages, and many believe that doing so will cause them to fade away before their time. Many Kokiri are frightened and distrustful of the world outside their village, and even Kokiri from other villages are sometimes shunned or ostracized for the differences between them. Members of other races rarely find Kokiri villages, and those who do are usually driven away by the use of clever tricks. Despite these tendencies, Kokiri are essentially kind-hearted, and it’s not unheard of for a village to take pity on a wounded traveler, leaving food where he can find it and salving his wounds while he sleeps.

Chosen of the Forest: You gain the Forest Walk ability. In addition, when in difficult terrain caused by trees, underbrush, or other plants you may make a Stealth check to become hidden with only cover or concealment, rather than supreme cover or total concealment

Distracting Faerie: Prerequisites: Kokiri, Rogue, Sneak attack class feature. Rather than granting a power bonus to hit, your Faerie Guidance power causes the target enemy to grant combat advantage. In addition, you may deal the extra damage granted by your Sneak Attack class ability to the target of your Faerie Guidance, even if you have already used it this round.

I think the faerie familiar should have its own mechanics and its own traits rather than simply being any familiar available.

I live and work in Japan, near Mt. Fuji, teaching English to High Schoolers. In my spare time I also happen to be a husband, a father, and an Otaku. I run a biweekly DnD game on Sundays and blog about it every other day of the week at http://thedumpstat.blogspot.com

This is an excellent interpretation of the Kokiri. Perhaps add a little fluff that if they spend more than a year away from their home village that they lose their immortality. I always imagined that the case was something like that, that they could spend a certain amount of time away, but they /risk/ dying, instead of outright dying, as it's implied.

In the area of feats, how about one that gives them proficiency with all spears and all simple and military light and heavy blades? I realise being small even restricts that list a lot, but it's a possibility, and they are shown with swords and spears, and although they are by no means militant, they are obviously trained.

I'm hesitant to include any sort of definitive "lose their immortality" clause for the Kokiri; mostly because I feel it's a bum deal for Kokiri adventurers, and also because I don't feel it's necessary. They can still be killed, they just don't die of age.

The Feat may work. Hadn't really seen the Kokiri as particularly weapon-oriented, but a proficiency feat may make sense - and should include slings, given the Kokiri slingshot I'd keep it to light blades, though - we don't see the Kokiri wielding anything bigger than a shortsword, in my opinion. How about this:

Kokiri Weapon TrainingYou gain proficiency with all Simple and Military light blades, spears, and slings. In addition, increase both the normal and long range of any sling you weild by 5.

Other Kokiri racial feats I thought up:

Blessed FaeriePrerequisites: Kokiri, Faerie Guidance racial power, any Divine classThe first time an ally misses with an attack against the subject of your Faerie Guidance power while it is still active, that ally regains hitpoints equal to your Wisdom modifier.

Faerie HunterPrerequisites: Kokiri, Ranger, Faerie Guidance racial power, Hunter's Quarry class featureIf the subject of your Faerie Guidance power has also been designated as your Hunter's Quarry, you gain concealment versus that enemy until the end of your next turn. In addition, you may count the distance between your Faerie Companion or yourself for the purposes of your hunter's Quarry and the Prime shot class feature. If you use the Beast Mastery class feature, you may count the distance from yourself, your Faerie Companion, or your Beast Companion to discern the nearest enemy.

Eyes of the ForestYou may ignore cover or concealment granted by any form of terrain noted with your Children of the Forest racial ability (usually only Forest). You treat Superior cover granted by this terrain as Cover, and Total Concealment granted by this terain as concealment.

And now, 'cuz I wanted to: A racial paragon Path. I'm still working on the 20th level daily power.

Emissary of the Deku Tree

“Wow, look at those bokoblin bandits running away! The Great Deku Tree is going to love hearing about this!”

Very few Kokiri choose to leave their secluded forest villages. The forest is their home, what they know. Sometimes, though, a Kokiri finds herself out in the wide world. Some are banished due to some offense to the village. Others find tracks and, curious, follow them out into the lands beyond the Forest. Some are sent out by the village or the Deku Treant who watches over it to perform some task.

Emissaries of the Deku Tree are those Kokiri who have been chosen by the Deku Tree or one of its Treant representatives to wander the world. Some serve as diplomats and representatives of the Kokiri to other civilizations. Others take a more passive role, observing the ways of the world beyond to report them back to the Deku Treant when, at long last, they return to their village homes. All are unusually open and daring for Kokiri, willingly wandering far from their homes in the forest for months, years, or even longer before their return.

Emissary of the Deku Tree path features:

Children of the World (11th level): Choose one source of difficult terrain other than forest (Ice, stone, or water). Your Children of the Forest ability is expanded, allowing you to ignore that kind of terrain as well as forested terrain while shifting.

Emissary’s Action (11th level): When you spend an Action Point to take an extra action, all enemies take a -2 to attacks made against you until the end of your next turn.

Branching Guidance (16th level): Your Faerie Guidance power changes. It now affects one or two enemies within the burst. At 26th level, it affects one, two, or three enemies within the burst.

Distracting Faerie Emissary of the Deku Tree attack 11

With a twinkle, your Faerie flits a quick circle around the enemy, confounding him and pointing out weak spots in his defenses at the same time

Encounter *

Minor Action Close Burst 1

Requirement: Your Faerie Companion must be in active mode, and the origin square of the burst is the Faerie Companion’s square

Target: One enemy within burst

Attack: Wisdom or Charisma +4 vs. Will

Level 21: Wisdom or Charisma +6 vs. Will

Hit: The enemy is dazed and slowed. These conditions end if, at the end of the Kokiri's turn, the Faerie Companion is no longer adjacent to the enemy.

Effect: During the round in which you use the Distracting Faerie power, you may use your Guiding Faerie racial power on this target as a free action, even if you have already expended it this encounter. This does not expend the power.

Untouchable Fairie Emissary of the Deku Tree Utility 12

Your fairie takes on a flickering, fluttering motion, confounding enemies who try to strike it in motion or as part of a group attack.

Daily *

Move action Personal

Your familiar shifts its speed. For the rest of the encounter, the Familiar no longer provokes Opportunity Attacks by moving and gains a +2 bonus to all defenses versus close and area attacks.

How's this look so far? Don't have my books with me, so I can't recall if it's already possible to make monster knowledge checks untrained - if it is, remove that bit. I imagine these Fairies rarely working for non-Deku spellcasters, but it happens sometimes.

Deku Fairy Familiar

A tiny globe of light glows beside you. Deep within, you can barely make out a beautiful humanoid shape with gossamer wings. “Hey!” She calls to you. “Listen!”

Senses: low-light visionSpeed: fly 6 (hover)

Constant BenefitsYou gain a +2 bonus to Monster Knowledge checks. In addition, you may attempt to make Monster Knowledge checks untrained.You can read & speak Hylian, if this language is used in your game.The Deku Fairy radiates dim light in a radius of 2 squares.

Active BenefitsFairy Speech: A Deku Fairy can speak any language you know, and it can converse with other creatures. When it speaks, you hear everything it says and hear everything spoken to it. You can dictate its answers if you so choose.

The action point ability is probably better off ending at the end of your next turn. They don't seem to like handing out saving throw based durations for those.

Distracting faerie seems in need of clarification. When you say as long as they're adjecent to your fairy do you mean that if they move away and then come back that they start being dazed and slowed again? Also for how long can you use fairy guidance on them?

Emissary's action could probably trigger whenever you spend an action point to gain another action, instead of being specific to an attack action. This doesn't seem like an aggressive enough Paragon path for the action point ability to be restricted to attacks.